


the rain of goodbye muttered

by berried



Category: Batgirl (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Naruto Fusion, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Elements of Canon and Naruto, F/M, Gen, Stephanie has a Fire Release, Stephanie is dead dead in this universe, Tim has three releases AND is a chakra master, and Kon is upset to be there, for both naruto and batman, there's no happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:35:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24571645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/berried/pseuds/berried
Summary: they tell you that war will tear you apart, that it'll leave scars on you that are hard to heal. they tell you all of that, but it doesn't prepare you. nothing will prepare you for this.( Alternate Universe where everyone is Naruto-esque ninjas, and they're in the fourth shinobi war. )
Relationships: Implied Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent - Relationship, Past Stephanie Brown/Tim Drake - Relationship, Stephanie Brown & Tim Drake
Kudos: 8





	the rain of goodbye muttered

**Author's Note:**

> A few actual serious notes about this, because it is a Naruto Alternate Universe fic.
> 
> Stephanie is actually dead, and has been brought back via the resurrection jutsu. She was never a full fledged ninja because of reasons, but practice everything that there was to be a ninja, but her level of skill is why she was brought back. Emotionally I pulled from the idea of Team Ten vs Asuma because nothing breaks me down more than that fight in Naruto.
> 
> Commission fic written for @twiceblooms on twitter! Thank you for donating and I had a lot of fun writing this.

They tell you a lot about war. They tell you how it'll be hell, how your back will hurt, your body will want to betray you, and how you'll fight, constantly, and you only rest because your body can't go on any longer -- not because you want to. They tell you, indirectly, how it'll haunt you, how it'll tear at your muscles and your mind and you'll carry it with you regardless of what you'll do in life.

( He's seen how Bruce and Dick look when they just get "caught up" in the moment. Cassie has told him how Donna is just a ghost of herself sometimes.)

They didn't tell him about this though.

"Are you fucking kidding me, Bruce?" Tim isn't sure if he sounds stressed when he chastises his mentor for this, but the look that Kon and Cassie give him tells him that he does. 

"You know her moves best." There's an unsaid sentence, Tim knows that Bruce wants to add  _ you practically trained her _ , but he doesn't. 

They don't tell you that war will sometimes make you fight your dead loved ones. 

"I'll do it, Tim." And before Tim can stop him, Kon takes off, and he thinks he's going to use brute force to stop here, because he's got way more chakra control than Tim (he's the one who should've followed in Clark's steps, if anything), and if Kon lands one hit on her, it's over.

But Stephanie fights dirty ("I'm fighting  _ smart _ ".) And she's out of the way before Kon can even get close to her, and Tim's chewing on his bottom lip.

He's a medic. He's supposed to be in the medic tent, but Bruce pulled him out and said that he was needed out here. And this is why, apparently. To fight her.

To fight the girl he loved. The girl he had planned on marrying and had even gotten a ring for.

("In our field of work, it's better to do it while you're young and you can." He had told Kon one night, showing him the ring, and his voice cracking just a bit.)

The girl whose name didn't get honored on the memorial stone because she wasn't  _ technically _ a ninja.

("She fought for our village! She died for us! For  _ you _ ."

"But her headband was yours." And Tim had sworn he'd never forgive Bruce for that.)

The girl who was the damn reason Tim had even gone into being a fucking medic in the first place. Because she didn't have enough chakra control, because she -- it had happened before she had even gotten a full  _ chance _ to tap into her chakra reserves and show the world what she could do.

"Hey Timmy, are you gonna fight me and put me back in the ground  _ or what _ ?" She's making a joke, she's always making a joke, but Tim knew the hand signals that she had just made, and she was now holding that fucking  _ flame kusarigama _ in her hands. 

It had been her own creation -- she had heard of the flame sword, and wanted to make something that worked before for her needs, and Tim had been so jealous because it hadn't been something you thought of, but Stephanie -- Stephanie always thought of how to work to her advantage. She had used a  _ kusarigama _ because she thought they looked cool, and believed the range was far better than the bo-staff Tim used (though she was just as trained with that), and then she had made this his own.

"Why me? Why not Cass?" His voice is dry, as he moves in front of her, he's working his fingers through seals, creating his own barrier, so that no one could interrupt them. And he can hear Kon's angry voice, hitting on the barrier because  _ he'll take her down if he has to _ , but Tim knows this is his fight. Not Kon's.

"When Ra's brought us back, he said he brought back the best, not the best and the ones who are morally aligned to follow Bruce and everyone." She throws the  _ blade _ , and Tim dodges it, but the minute he does, he knows he stepped where she wanted him to, because she's throwing tags at him.

(He knows they're the tags that she made herself. Tim had always teased her about her seals and tags, saying that they were almost as good as his, but the unpredictability of them would make them better than his.)

"So she's gotta deal with daddy issues somewhere out there, and you gotta deal with the whole dead girlfriend thing  _ again _ ." And Tim knows she's laughing, but he knows it hurts.

Because she's dead. Stephanie Brown is dead. And now he has to fight her, and make her go away again. Get her sealed and let her rest as peacefully as she could again. 

They don't tell you about this part of war. Nothing could have prepared him for this.

"Come on Timmy, you know how to take me down, you've done it a  _ million _ times." She's taunting him, but she's right. They used to train together, when Stephanie was working as a ninja without  _ being _ a ninja. Tim's got water release  _ and _ earth release, and he knows a few air release techniques as well but those are useless in this situation. And he's got all the barriers and  _ much better _ seals he can make. And he's got the better chakra control than the two of them, and he can destroy a mountain at fucking will.

All Stephanie has is flame release techniques -- but she's good at thinking on her feet, and she doesn't give up.

And Tim's got the baggage of knowing that if he had been there, if he had just  _ been there _ he might've been able to stop Sinois from killing her. Or maybe he would've been able to heal her of her injuries.

(No. He wouldn't have. Clark had said that they were too grave. He may have been able to fix Bart, but he  _ couldn't _ fix Stephanie.)

And the baggage of not even being there when she died. She died with Bruce at her side, and Bruce had met him at the fucking gates to let him know that she was gone. 

"Think  _ fast."  _ And there's the fucking blade coming at him again. And for Tim, thinking fast right now means manipulating the earth and pulling it upwards, creating a physical barrier between the two of them while he actually thinks, tries to think of how he can hurt her. How he can get her incapacitated so that the sealing team can put her back in the scroll and she can rest again.

"Come on, Tim, you're better than that." Stephanie always had such a way with words, and those words meant making fun of Tim, even when she knows it's inevitable that she loses, but she's going to have fun with it.

Right.

( "It's okay to have fun with this." Tim had told her, back in the beginning, before she became too loose and before he became too serious. Before she was tortured by a man trying to take over their village.)

That was how they both got so good, wasn't it? Thinking on your feet, having fun with whatever the hell you were doing. It was how Stephanie, who didn't have a water release to save her life, once managed to get her fucking hands on the fucking  _ Kiba _ twin swords from someone in the Seven Swordsman of the Mist. She had proudly showed them off to Tim, and said that she may not have a water release, but she thinks she's got the ability to do lightning release stuff.

Bruce confiscated them from her, and told her she didn't know what kind of forces she was tempting by doing something like that, and reminded her that she  _ wasn't _ a ninja. 

(That didn't stop Tim from falling even more in love with her, or training her even more.)

"How am I supposed to have fun when you're fucking dead?" Tim's throat is still dry, but he's working this out in his head, all over again because he hasn't fought Stephanie in so long. 

She's a fire release (with lightning capabilities, he doesn't know if someone in the Pure Land maybe taught her anything. Hell, he doesn't even know if that's possible.) She can still do seals, but she's not as fast as making them on the spot as Tim is. She's got her flame  _ kusarigama,  _ so Tim knows that he has to get close to her, or get as far back as possible from her, because she's controlling him with long-range. 

"Close it is, huh?" He can't help but laugh a bit. He's still got the barrier in tact, and he knows Kon is on the other side, wanting to get in and help him, but Tim is focusing all of his chakra in his feet, so that he can use the barrier to walk, to get a hand on Steph.

"That's the spirit. I guess!" He's running fast, and he's able to dodge her, the fiery head of her  _ kusarigama  _ coming once more, but Tim's able to dodge it, as he goes through the hand seals he needs. Snake, Dog, Snake, and then he's pushing himself off of the roof of the barrier, forming the hand seal for Water release, then Earth release, before his hand is smacking the ground in front of Stephanie.

She had been prepared for him to hit her, or kick her, and she's caught off guard by what he's doing. Even more so, when her legs begin sinking into the ground.

"Bottomless Mud Hole." Tim is a bit proud of himself, and he's still got his chakra channeled into his feet, so that he doesn't fall victim to his own way to keep her trapped.

"Oh, so you've learned some new tricks?" Stephanie's got that grin on her face, and she's swinging the  _ kusarigama _ around, and Tim nearly falls prey because he's missed that smile, but he knows he should be wary, because Stephanie always smiles like that when she's got something up her sleeves. Her  _ kusarigama  _ is fading in her hands until they're empty, but Tim doesn't let up, he knows her.

This is why Bruce wanted Tim to take her on.

"I've got a few too." And the way she starts doing hand seals, Tim almost doubts her, because there's, objectively, no way that Stephanie knows how to do something like that  _ but _ he doesn't know what Stephanie had been up to before she died, and he's got to tap into one of the wind release techniques that he knows, because Stephanie --

Stephanie is doing the fucking handseals for  _ Kirin _ , and Tim has never actually seen it, he only knew that she was  _ working _ on it, but he didn't know she actually managed to fucking make it before she died. Either way, he's doing  _ Wind Release: Pressure Damage  _ and he's hoping whoever is watching over him that this is enough to overpower her.

"Gotcha." She's dropped her seals, nothing actually comes of it, but it's too late for Tim. He's got her trapped in this barrier with him, and he's throwing one of his most powerful wind release techniques at her. He can see her crumbling, pieces of paper from whatever the fuck Ra's used to bring her back falling off one by one. 

"Drop the barrier. Get the sealing team over here, and finish me off." And he hates that she's right. He hates that he hurt her, he hates that this is happening, and there are tears on his face, they sting but he does what she says. He's dropped the barrier, and working on his finishing moves.  _ Cherry blossom impact _ \-- breaking up all the ground beneath Stephanie, freeing her of the mud release he had trapped her in earlier.

The final blow.  _ Heavenly Foot of Pain _ . He doesn't want to bring it down on Stephanie. Never in a million years did he think he would ever bring it on her -- but here he is. The final blow, and she's done for.

And it takes all his strength, not his physical strength but his emotional strength as well to do this. To take her down with this technique. 

When the dust settled, Tim's breathing heavy, and Stephanie -- what's left of her, too many pieces of paper have crumbled and fluttered away -- is laying there, and she can't help but laugh a bit.

"Look at you, crying, what a loser, Boy Virgin." She's still laughing, and the tears are hot on Tim's face. They sting, and he can't find himself to laugh and despite everything, despite the fact that he can hear Kon telling him to move back so the sealing team can finish, Tim drops down to her side, shaking his head, his voice is caught in his throat.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry." And he doesn't know what he's apologizing for, but he's apologizing to her for something, and his throat is sticky and thick, and this is his fault. Just like before, just like when she got captured by that fucking Sionis and tortured and fucking killed, this is  _ his _ fault.

"Oh shut up." Stephanie's laughing, and the Sealing Team is right there, but maybe Kon had a change of heart, because he's told them to just give them a minute. "You didn't do anything wrong." And Tim is sure that if she could cry too, she'd probably be crying as well. "Take your time on joining me on the other side. If I see you too soon, I'm gonna be mad." 

And Tim knows that she means it. And he wipes at his eyes with the back of his hand, and tells himself that he's going to live for her. And he's going to meet her, not soon -- but later, much much later. He steps back, to let the Sealing Team take over from here. 

"Take care of him until he gets to me, okay?" Stephanie isn't talking to him this time, and he can sense a change in Kon's chakra flux, and Stephanie throws her head back to laugh at both of them. 

"I love you, Boy Wonder." 

They don't tell you that war will have you crying in the battle field, sobbing ugly cries, while your teammates comfort you. They don't tell you that it'll have you doubting everything, revisiting every moment to see what you could've done differently.

They don't tell you how it makes you fight harder for the ones you love. For the ones you lost.

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from [midnight orchestra](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=We-Lea2MLJc), naruto shippuden ending #16


End file.
